


Tuluk tu Vokau

by jaegermighty



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Disturbing Themes, Dystopia, F/M, Memory Alteration, Memory Loss, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-03
Updated: 2013-07-03
Packaged: 2017-12-17 13:00:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/867817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaegermighty/pseuds/jaegermighty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I do not know," T'Pol says, frowning. "But it is important."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tuluk tu Vokau

**Author's Note:**

  * For [HopefulNebula](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HopefulNebula/gifts).



Trip first sees her at the market, across the crowd, waiting in line at an urun'ha stand. She's wearing a red cloak - that means she's a scholar, or works for one, way out of his league, shouldn't even be lookin' at her honestly, but - her head is covered with a blue scarf, brighter than the sky itself.

He can't see her face, but he knows her. He _knows_ her.

"Ho," says Jai, "what's your drift?"

"You know that gal?" Trip says. Jai follows the line of his hand, bushy eyebrows drawing together in confusion. Trip can see the moment his friend spots her, watches the surprise flit across his face, the quick one-two glance he takes to check for Caretakers that might be watching. "You recognize her?"

"Nah," says Jai, turning his face away. "You don't neither."

"No," says Trip, "I think - "

"She's a Red," Jai interrupts, "you _don't_."

Trip shuts up. 

"C'mon, we best get walking," Jai says, clapping Trip once on the shoulder, "we'll miss the train."

"Yeah," Trip replies absently, "alright."

Trip picks up the canvas and follows Jai, but he looks back at the last minute, and catches one last glimpse of that scarf, that burst of color in a sea of brown and grey. He wonders what her hair looks like. He thinks it might be brown.

He wonders if she was lookin' back, too. 

 

 

Jai and Trip work well together; they got the same temperament, the same work ethic (mainly, "if it's worth doin' you do it well and you do it right") and they get on well, too, just as a bonus. That's where they're lucky - most Greens partner up out of necessity, and there's so few of them in the city that it's a lot like trying to find a soul mate in a waiting room.

They've got a good set up, at any rate. They pick up the merch on the first day of each suncycle, and spend the first quarter going 'round to all their regulars - the Reds first, scholars always get first pick, then the doctors - Blues - and any Caretakers who happen upon them and find themselves interested. Then the rest of the time, they jump from empty spot to empty spot at the market downtown, selling off their excess and building up their contacts with the other Greens. That's Jai's idea. He's all about contacts.

"Don't wanna be selling this shit forever," he always says, "the more friends we've got - think about it. Somebody gets arrested, takes off, gets blanked - who knows first? The Green the poor sucker was partnered with, that's who. That's how we work our way up, brother. By keepin' our eyes open."

Trip tries to picture it, doing something different, selling something different, living closer to the Library - but he can't. All he can seem to imagine is what he has now, which is - well, an existence of a sort, he supposes. Considering what he's heard about the Greens who live outside the city borders, he figures he should be grateful.

"That's your problem," Jai will say, gesturing at Trip with a bottle of dor wine, "you got no imagination."

"More like 'no ambition,'" Trip corrects, "nothin' wrong with bein' content, Jai. You could stand to use some of it."

Jai snorts. "Contentness, huh," he says. It sounds like a curse. "That's the worst sickness of 'em all."

 

 

Trip sees her again three days later, running the stand alone since Jai's home in bed with a flare-up of the cough. Or, rather, it's more like he looks up from a supply log and suddenly she's just...there.

"Ho," he blurts, in surprise. She's wearing the blue scarf again.

"Ho," she greets evenly. Trip stares at her face dumbly, and she raises one peculiarly angled eyebrow. "I would like to purchase a jar of ointment."

"Oh." Trip blinks, remembers his life, and is jolted back into movement. "Right, right, o'course. You need - how much you need?"

Her stare is a little unnerving, the way she looks him directly in the eye, the intensity of her stance. Trip can't remember the last time a Red looked him in the eye. Maybe never. "I am unsure," she says. She's got a strange way of talking, too, the way she says each word so precisely. Trip likes it. "What is the purpose of your product?"

Trip blinks at her again. "You wanna buy some, but you don't know what it does?"

"Is it not your job to explain it?" she asks, which is the classiest way Trip's ever been called a dumbass in his entire life.

He clears his throat, feeling his cheeks flush a little with embarrassment. "Er, alright, it's - " he takes a deep breath. "What we've got here is genuine nettle wax from the Hun'nal Mountain range in - well, you know 'em, probably - distilled into a topical ointment by Blue physicians from the North." Trip watches as she raises her other eyebrow, wincing internally. "Uh - sounds cheesy cuz it's a sales pitch, but it's all true, ma'am. Honest."

"Nettles are a breed of insect," she comments. "I was not aware their wax had any medicinal purpose."

"Well, you wouldn't, see," Trip explains, "it's an old home remedy, really. Lotsa folks swear by it though, and it seems to work just fine on me and my partner." He snags one of the sample jars and unscrews the lid, holding it out in his palm. "Take a whiff, see what I mean."

The woman pauses, glancing up at Trip's face, as if gauging his sincerity. Her facial expression hasn't changed since she first walked up, but somehow Trip can sense that she's wary of him. And why wouldn't she be. "A...whiff?"

"Smell," Trip says. "It helps with the cough." 

She gives him one last, long glance before leaning forward cautiously to inhale the air over the jar. Trip can feel the heat of her skin on his hand she's so close, feels frozen in place, breath catching tight in his chest.

"Oh," she says, pulling back. The look on her face is the same one Trip sees on most of his customers, that crippling, momentary relief from the constant burden of the cough, a breath of sweet, fresh air that cuts right through the congestion. "That is...impressive."

"Like I said, lotta people swear by it." Trip takes a quick sniff himself before closing the jar, trying to distract himself from the way her hands are clasped over the strap of her canvas. "You can use it for most minor scrapes and burns, helps the healin' go quicker. And if you rub some beneath your nose, it'll last a few hours, give you some relief. Helps 'specially if you spend a lot of time downtown."

"How much?" she asks, her face rearranging itself into blankness again. 

"Thirty credits for the small, sixty for the large," Trip says. "If you want to buy more than that at one time, we take special orders, though you'll have to wait until the next shipment. Happens the first day of each cycle."

"A large jar will be sufficient for the time being," she says, reaching into her canvas and pulling out a small coin purse. 

"Right," Trip says, clearing his throat again. He turns to pull out the transaction book, trying to ignore the odd shake in his hands, the strange lightheaded feeling. He must be feelin' worse today than he thought, going crazy like this over a Red woman. The heat has to be getting to him. Something. "I'll just, uh, wrap one up for you."

"No need," she says, holding out her canvas. Trip swallows once and drops a large jar into it carefully, only barely avoiding contact with her bare hands. "Thank you."

"No, uh, thank you," Trip says, sweeping up the credit pieces she's set on the wooden surface of the stand. "For your patronage, ma'am, it's an - an honor."

She inclines her head politely, eyes still fixed on his face.

"May you go with wisdom," Trip intones, remembering tradition finally. 

"T'Pol," the woman says.

Trip starts. "What?"

"My name is T'Pol." She blinks once, twice, then turns away sharply. Trip stares at her. "May you go with wisdom," she says quickly, and walks away without another word. Trip watches her go, gobsmacked, more lightheaded than ever.

T'Pol, he thinks. Yeah, that sounds right.

 

 

He's been having these dreams for months now, although it feels like they've been apart of his life for forever. It's stupid, though, because they didn't start until after the accident. He only remembers having them after the hospital, but - still. They feel so normal. It's why he hasn't told anyone about them. 

"You are sad tonight," she comments.

"Yeah, I suppose. Jai's sick again."

"Has he seen a physician?"

"Jai? Go to a Blue?" Trip snorts. "Too stubborn to do somethin' as practical as that."

He can't see her face; it's blurry, out of focus, like it always is. But he can picture the look she gives him all the same. 

"You could persuade him," she says. 

"I could try," he replies. 

He hears her make a sound, like a cross between a huff and a sigh. It makes him smile.

"When's the last time anyone managed to persuade you to do anything?" he asks.

She considers this for a moment. "I do not recall."

"Right." He snorts. "That code for 'none of your business'?"

"No."

"Uh huh."

"You are very frustrating."

Trip laughs. "It's my best trait, sweetheart."

"Hardly."

Trip can feel her amusement, little bubbly sparks of it. "You don't mean that."

"Perhaps."

Trip feels her lean in his direction ever so slightly, can feel how close she is by the heat of her body, so close by. He doesn't dare try to touch her, though. He's afraid it'll make her disappear.

"I must go." He hears her exhale. "I will..."

"Yeah." He sighs. "Yeah, I will, too."

He thinks she might've said something else, but he wakes up, so he doesn't hear it. 

 

 

Jai's out for almost eight days. On the ninth, she - T'Pol - comes again. 

"Ma'am," Jai says respectfully. His voice is still rough with cough, but Trip hadn't been able to convince him to stay in bed again. "How may we serve you?"

"I would like to purchase a large jar," she says. 

"You went through the last one already?" Trip asks, surprised. He whistles through his teeth, before he can stop himself. Jai glances at him sharply.

"It has helped me immensely," she says. 

"The cough?" Trip asks, sympathetically. 

"The smell." She pauses, pursing her lips slightly. "My olfactory senses are...acute."

"What a drag," Trip says, in an intensely good mood all of a sudden. He notices that she's tied her blue scarf a bit farther back on her head today; he can see a bit of her hair. It's brown, just like he'd thought.

"We'd be happy to assist you, ma'am," Jai says, sending Trip a quelling look. Trip pretends not to see it. "Nettle wax is excellent for many purposes."

T'Pol looks at him, assessing. Trip watches with amusement as he squirms. "Yes," she finally says, "I agree."

"Well," Trip says briskly, reaching behind him to snag two large jars, "you better take two today, then. Since you went through the last one so quick."

"Thank you," T'Pol says slowly, "but one shall be sufficient."

Trip starts to argue, then stops, caught by the slight twitch in her hands, the way her chin lifts upwards slightly. Oh, he thinks. "Whatever you say, ma'am."

T'Pol inclines her head.

"That will be sixty credits, ma'am," Jai says roughly. 

"I remember," she says, handing over the pieces. Jai leaves them on the stand.

"Here you are," Trip says, dropping the jar into her outstretched canvas. "Don't use it up too quick, now."

"I shall endeavor to make it last," she says. Trip grins at her, charmed for some unfathomable reason.

"Your patronage is an honor, ma'am," Jai says.

"May you both go with wisdom," says T'Pol, and walks away. Trip watches her go.

"Trip." Jai's scowling when Trip finally tears his eyes away. "Are you touched in the head?"

"Nah, brother," Trip says. "Don't sweat it."

"Don't sweat - "

"I ain't planning a wedding or nothin'," Trip snaps, "just bein' friendly, damn it."

Jai narrows his eyes and mutters something darkly under his breath, but he lets the subject drop, and they don't talk about it again. 

Her eyes are brown.

 

 

Trip's only seen the Library once, the day he was demoted. All the demotions go on down there. It's tradition.

It's this great hulking mass of a building - an eyesore, really, though Trip wouldn't dare say that out loud to no one. Everything's made out of blackstone, to be as intimidating as possible, and you can't get inside unless you're a Red or with a Caretaker escort.

Trip doesn't remember much about that day; his head was still dizzy from the medicine the Blues gave him, still half-conscious and barely aware of his own thoughts, let alone the world around him. He'd been in a wheelchair; the Caretaker who'd been escorting him had felt bad for him, apparently. 

"Citizen Green," they'd said to him, and he remembers this because it'd sounded so strange. Who talks like that, seriously? "You are hereby demoted to Level Seven for Minor Crimes against the State. Do you understand your redistrictation?"

"Now, that ain't even a word," he'd mumbled.

It'd been the accident, a sympathetic Blue had explained to him later. Trip had been at the high-rise market, the fancy one, selling juuy fruit. He'd stayed late one night and drank too much dor at the bar and crashed his transport into the side of a building. He'd been lucky it was just a storage warehouse, the Blue had said. If it'd been anything more important they would've done a lot worse to him than just toss him to the mercies of the ground market. 

Trip thinks if he remembered any of that shit, it'd probably sting worse. As it is, it ain't so bad. Jai's a good guy, and nettle wax is a good product, so business is fine. Their quarters are high-rise, so at least they can sleep above the smog. The cough's worse, spending so much time on the ground, sure, but hell, he's got access to as much nettle as he needs. 

And now there's T'Pol. So. Not so bad. 

 

 

She never comes to the stand when Jai is there. He notices it right away, and thinks, of course. Of course she's not going to let him see. He's an unknown variable.

To anyone watching (to the Caretakers watching), it must seem like he's simply gained another regular customer. They never speak for very long, and she buys a jar each time. He's also pretty sure that she's genuinely using it all, since she sometimes opens it up for a sniff before she puts it in her canvas. He offers her two jars every time. She only ever buys one.

But while Caretakers can watch damn near everything, hearing is harder. They've got regular ears just like everyone else. And what's happening with T'Pol is definitely not what it seems.

"I work for a scientist," she tells him one day. The next: "I create star charts. It is quite tedious." Then, on another afternoon, "I used to be an astrophysicist. Or so they tell me."

Trip says back: "I thought you were," and "yeah, my job's more tedious, I'd bet," and "I used to sell juuy. They told me that, too."

Always like that, small exchanges of information squeezed in between _go with wisdom_ s and _your patronage is an honor_ s. They're like air, like fresh water, like a breath of nettle in the middle of a smoky day at the height of summer. Trip doesn't know how he ever went without 'em. 

He's playing a dangerous game, he knows that. This is how people get banished, get blanked. He remembers Niren, the Green who used to sell fabric, who got caught with a Yellow and was blanked the very next morning. Sasra, that sweet-faced Blue who was banished for being "too familiar" with a Red too far above her rank. This ain't something to mess around with. 

("I dislike the color red," T'Pol tells him one day, an expression of such delicate distaste on her face.)

He doesn't particularly care.

 

 

They always put Greens with the Yellows. Trip's heard stories about other cities, where they have enough Greens that they get their own quarter buildings. But not here.

Greens are the lowest, of course, above nobody but the blanked. Yellow's the next step up, and Trip sometimes wonders about that, about who makes these decisions. It's another thing he doesn't really talk about to anybody.

"Hey, handsome," greets Marai. She's the Yellow who lives next door, always hangin' out in the hallway. Lookin' for customers, he supposes. "Long day?"

Trip drops his canvas by his front door, rummaging in the pocket of his cloak for his key card. He always loses track of it. "Yeah," he replies, wincing at the roughness of his own voice.

"Oh," Marai says, grimacing. "You sound like yaiyay shit."

"Thanks, Marai," Trip says dryly. "Just what a man likes to hear."

"You wanna come in for awhile?" she asks, moving her shoulder slightly so her cloak tumbles loose, revealing the angle of her collarbone. "I'll make you some tea."

"Now, now," Trip says, finally digging out the key card, "that'd be against the rules."

Marai smiles ruefully and shrugs. "Always the straight-shooter, huh, Trip."

"You've got no idea," Trip says truthfully, and leaves her to it. 

(Greens aren't allowed to patronize Yellows. Which makes the decision to house them together take on a whole different context.

This is another thing Trip doesn't say out loud.)

 

 

" - gravitational force applied to any given object in space per unit mass, which is equal to the gravitational acceleration of said object. However it fails to take into account the precession of the peri - "

"What in the hell are you talkin' about," Trip says.

The woman pauses. "I am not sure."

"You're not sure? You sounded pretty sure."

"I - " she stops short. "It is something I remember. I do not know why, nor do I have any context for it. But I am...preoccupied with it, and many other things."

"Preoccupied with me?" Trip asks cheekily. "You are the woman of my dreams, after all."

Trip doesn't need to see her face to know that she's glaring at him. "False. It is you who are occupying my dream."

"So we're dreaming of each other?" Trip considers this. "Well, that's downright romantic."

"You find this romantic?"

"Sorta," Trip says. "All the...white. It's soothing."

"I agree." She sounds mildly surprised. 

Trip can feel that pulling, that tells him he's about to lose her. He can recognize it now. "Don't let it distract you too much, sweetheart," he tells her quickly. "Gotta stay sharp."

"Indeed," is the last thing he hears, and then he wakes up. 

Indeed, he thinks with amusement, and lets that word carry him back into sleep. 

 

 

The Caretaker patrols keep doubling. Everybody notices, but nobody talks about it. Then again, when does anybody talk about anything, Trip thinks bitterly. 

Jai's stepped out for a drink, and T'Pol's there, buying her jar. She's long since lost the blue scarf. Trip keeps wanting to ask her why she stopped wearing it, but he always gets distracted.

"There is talk," T'Pol murmurs, leaning over the stand ever so slightly, pretending to dig in her canvas for her coin purse. "They do not let me watch the news, but there are visitors from off-world at the Library. I know this for a fact."

Trip turns away to reach for a jar to cover his reaction. "What kind of visitors?"

"I do not know." T'Pol finally emerges with her coin purse, opening it slowly, deliberately. Behind her, a blank wanders by aimlessly, an empty-headed phantom.

"I want to see you," Trip blurts, "somewhere - else. Private."

T'Pol blinks at him. "Private?"

"We should talk," Trip finishes lamely, wondering if he's just fucked this up beyond all repair. 

But all T'Pol does is withdraw her credit pieces, placing them carefully on the stand, inches away from his outstretched palm. "Miss the train tonight," she says. It sounds like an order. 

Trip hands her the nettle jar. "Okay." 

"May you go with wisdom," she says. 

"Your patronage is an honor," he replies.

 

 

("I ain't gonna be stuck down there forever," Jai said, the other night. They were drinking in their quarters, taking turns staring out their tiny window, watching the moons rotate across the sky. "Maybe you're alright bein' content, but I can't do it, I'll die. It's killin' me, Trip. It's killin' all of us."

"You think I don't know that?" Trip had said, angrily. "I got eyes, same as you. You think I don't know what they're doing?"

"I think you got a death wish or somethin'," Jai snapped. "Getting demoted like you did, just bein' reckless and stupid. Carrying on with that Red woman, thinkin' I don't know about it - "

"What do you know," Trip said sharply.

"I know, they know, you're stupid if you think otherwise," Jai said. His face was creased in frustration. "You can't fight 'em, Trip. You just can't. You gotta play their game. That's how you survive." He gulped down the last of the dor, grimacing. "But you wouldn't know about that, would you."

"You'd be pretty fuckin' surprised at what I know, Jai," Trip had said in frustration. He regrets saying it, now. But he did say it.

"Fuck off," Jai said, tossing the dor bottle against the wall. It shattered, barely missing Trip's legs. "Just - fuck off, Trip."

They haven't really...talked much, since.)

 

 

He deliberately spills the entire wagon of nettle, fifteen minutes before they're due to leave for the train. The look on Jai's face is the very definition of 'bloody murder.'

"Go," Trip says, inserting just enough resignation into his tone to make it seem real. "I'll handle it."

"You can't," Jai says angrily, "you'll miss the - "

"There're hostels down here for a reason, Jai," Trip says. Jai is silent, shifting his weight from one foot to the other restlessly. "Just go, don't argue with me. It's my fault, I should be the one to stay." And you can't afford to stay, is what he doesn't say. Trip knows Jai hears it anyway.

"Watch your back," Jai says severely. "And smother yourself in nettle, you hear me? I'll see you in the morning."

"Sleep tight, buddy," Trip says.

"Fuckin' _idiot_ ," Jai replies, and leaves.

He lingers over the mess until most everyone is gone - he'd picked a sort of out-of-the-way spot for the stand today for this very reason. He's not particularly worried about the Caretakers. They're just as eager as any of them to get off the ground.

"Trip," he hears, and there she is. He wonders for the millionth time how she always manages to sneak up on him like that.

"Hey, sweetheart," he says. She inclines her head, once.

They stick to the shadows, the side streets where they're less likely to run into anyone. There are people who are down here full-time, Greens who miss the train, Yellows meeting with customers who want to be discreet, and of course blanked people who don't know better. But they don't see anyone who would care, at a Green and a Red walkin' together after hours. There's a Yellow who gives them the nod as they pass by, but he doesn't seem bothered by them, and after they pass him, they see no one.

"This is my office," T'Pol says, stopping at the door of a nondescript, darkened building. 

"You work on the ground?" Trip asks, surprised. "I didn't know they did that to Reds."

"I am not a typical Red," T'Pol says, and gestures him inside. 

He's thought about what a space that belongs to her might look like; and for the most part, he's mostly right. It's clinically clean. Dim. Star maps on the wall. That blue scarf, folded neatly over the back of a chair. 

"May I offer you some - "

"What's this?" Trip interrupts, zeroing in on a folder, laying open on the desk. "Is this - "

"I wanted to show you." T'Pol hesitates. "I am unsure why."

Trip lifts the sheaf of paper carefully, frowning at the symbols on it. They're not like any letters he's ever seen, written vertically, with strange dots and swooping lines. "What are they?"

"I am unsure of that too." T'Pol walks over and takes the bundle from him, flipping through to the most recent page. "I have been updating it regularly. Each time I...recall a new sequence, I record it here."

"These are things you've been _rememberin'_?" 

"My mind seems quite preoccupied with them." A delicate crease forms between T'Pol's eyebrows. "As it is with you, as well."

"Me?" Trip starts to feel his hands shake again. 

"It is quite perplexing."

"Perplexing." Trip breathes out roughly. "That's a hell of a way to put it, darlin'."

T'Pol cocks her head and says nothing, watching him carefully. Trip shivers a bit. 

"I've got scars I can't explain," he blurts. "They - the accident, that got me demoted? It messed up my legs a bit, so that's - whatever - but there's stuff on my arms, my shoulders - burn marks and bullet wounds. Something like a knife scar on my left bicep. What kind of Green, a juuy merchant for that matter, has wounds like that?"

"You think we are being deceived."

"Well, of course we're bein' deceived," Trip says hotly, "have you taken a look around lately?"

T'Pol sears him with a look that makes him feel like saying something mean and then covering his face. It's sort of amazing.

"You know what they do to people," he says, "you've seen the blanks. They've got _machines_ that do that. They use that as _punishment_ , and then they just set them loose and let them wander around in the middle of everythin' until they starve to death or walk into traffic, just as a reminder of what they're capable of. For a government that does _that_ , nothing's out of bounds."

T'Pol lowers her gaze briefly, to the pages she still holds in her hands. The last bit of script - words, they're words - drops off halfway, with the ink smeared a little at the ends, like she was interrupted. She probably was. 

"Yes," she says. "You are right."

"I know," Trip says.

"There is little we can do about it," T'Pol continues.

Trip sighs. "Know that, too," he replies. "Nice of ya to point it out, though."

 

 

Trip dreams sometimes about other places. Bright forests with rippling streams and birds that look like clouds, deserts made of orange sand, nebulas that streak across the sky in fantastic palates of color. A ship, with an engine made of light. 

But most of all he dreams about a deck, or a porch maybe, made from yellow-painted wood. He always sits on a swing, and there's always a woman who sits next to him. He can never see her face either, but he knows she's dead now.

"Trip, you're an idiot," she'll say, sometimes, or, "don't be so obtuse," that one's his favorite, just for the way her voice sounds, so high and mighty and emphatic, like she's just so committed to explaining to him how thick he is. 

"Quit dickin' around," that one shows up a lot too, and: "we need you back home." He don't like that one as much.

It's when she says "I miss you" that's the worst, though. 'Cause he doesn't know who she is, but he misses her like hell, too.

 

 

T'Pol has this cot set up in the back, behind a bookshelf, and she apologizes for its inadequacy. 

"Don't worry 'bout it, we've made do with worse," Trip says, without thinking of it, and they both freeze in place and stare at each other for a while.

"Indeed," T'Pol says.

They lie down together without much talk one way or the other about it - propriety or color-crossing fraternization laws seem distant and silly in this room. It's a sort of calm that comes with touching each other - even just the innocent ones, her hand on his shoulder as she leans in to turn off the light, brushing her thigh with his arm as he pulls the blankets up. Trip feels better than he has in months; the aches are gone. The cough is gone. It's all just - peace.

"Listen," he says, "I don't know what the truth is, but I don't much care. You and me, that's truth. Whatever happens, we'll - well, we'll figure it out, I guess. Not much else we can do."

"A realistic take on the situation," is T'Pol's answer. He can't see her face. "I...am glad to have found you."

"Are you ever gonna say my name?" Trip asks. "I know you know it."

"Trip," T'Pol murmurs. "Nam-tor du goh ashayam t'nash-veh."

Trip breathes in slowly, heart beating so rapidly he can feel it in his throat. "What does that mean?"

"I do not know," T'Pol says, frowning. "But it is important."

 

 

"I don't remember anything from before six months ago," Trip says, that night in the white space.

"Neither do I," she replies. 

Trip is silent for a very long moment. "T'Pol," he greets.

"Yes, k'diwa."

Trip reaches out for her hand blindly. She grabs it, holds on.

**Author's Note:**

> I got most of the Vulcan words from [this fantastic Tumblr](http://vulcanlanguage.tumblr.com/) (specifically, what T'Pol says to Trip) and the [Vulcan Language Dictionary](http://redradar.net/vld/search.php). Both of those sources are way smarter than me. Also I took the science talk from Wikipedia. Don't judge, yo, I was an English major. xox


End file.
